New and More Threatening Form of ‘Dedovshchina’ Plaguing Russian Military

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Dec. 21 – The Russian military was notorious for dedovshchina, a term that refers to the beating of more junior soldiers by more senior ones or by members of different ethnic or regional groups; but in recent years, the shortening of the draft cycle and efforts by Moscow have reduced this problem.

            But in its place has arisen what has become “a stable system of a new kind of dedovshchina, when in the role of ‘granddads’ [as those doing the oppression] are not older soldiers but ordinary civilians living in population points near where military units are stationed” (ura.news/articles/1036283668).

            Sometimes in collusion with officers who apparently get a cut of the proceeds and sometimes on their own, criminal groups in these places extract money from soldiers by threatening to expose their misdeeds real or imagined to commanders. Few complain because they fear that the officers will in fact punish them while no one will punish these criminals.

            According to experts cited by the URA news agency, this system has “become the norm” throughout much of the country, especially in garrisons far from major cities, and involves the payment of hundreds of thousands of rubles every month by soldiers who are thus reduced to penury and made even more dependent on their commanders.

            URA reports that the defense ministry won’t talk about the problem and that prosecutors are reluctant to bring cases because they involve dealing at one and the same time military and civilian personnel. In that gray area, criminal groups have found a profitable niche; and no one appears ready to do much about it.